The Delta Museum and Archives Society recently launched Our Delta Stories, a project that asks community members to share their favourite Delta story in 250 words or less. The stories will be posted to the society’s social media pages and website, while some will also be printed in the Optimist. This story comes from George, Lily, Susie and Elsie Cheng.
The Cheng (Jang) family has lived and farmed in Delta for more than 100 years.
Tommy (Chung Tong Jang) arrived in 1913 at the age of 20 as a migrant farm worker in East Delta. He milked cows for several dairy farmers and lived on the dike at the end of Embree Road (104th Street). He lived in a small house with no utilities and rented three to four acres that he grew potatoes on. The house was used to raise chickens before he lived there.
Tommy sponsored his son George (Fook Chin Cheng) in 1951 and the two lived together on the dike, worked for other potato farmers and grew their own potatoes. Electricity was then installed into the home.
George’s wife Lily (Yu Chow Cheng) arrived in 1956. She was pregnant with their first child and lived with relatives in New Westminster. Later that year a house and three acres were bought on Fairview Road (46A Street). The house was owned by the Cooper family. The Coopers owned a flower shop in town called Cooper Flowers.
The following year another house and one-acre plot was bought on 46A Street. That house was rented out. In later years, four more acres were purchased on Savoy Street. The Chengs farmed their own land and rented land.
In the early years, George supplemented the farm income by working in the winter as a chef at the Royal City Café in New Westminster and the Hong Kong Inn in Ladner, among others.
George and Lily had six children: Susie, Bruce, William, Elsie, May and Robert. The children worked on the farm and still remember the hard labour of planting and harvesting root crops and the hazards of getting stuck in the mud in the rainy season.
In 1973, the eight acres, but not the houses, on Fairview Road and Savoy Street were sold and 11 acres were bought on Kettles Road. The Fairview Road acreage became part of the new subdivision adjacent to Port Guichon Elementary.
The Chengs farmed about 100 acres in total at this time. They grew turnips and warba, russet, Pontiac and Kennebec potatoes. The Chengs provided their produce to the BC Coast Vegetable Marketing Board for distribution.
A photo of George was hung in the marketing board’s offices. It was also displayed at the marketing board’s booth at the PNE in the late 1970s. It was titled “The Turnip King.”
George retired from farming in 1998.
He and Lily were recognized in July by the Delta Hospital Foundation for 18 continuous years of support.
